Anxiety: how the alarm goes off in the brain

A recent study managed to set the alarm bell that the… fear in the brain human. It is believed that the culprit is there molecule of the name Cgrp. This opens up various sensory signals. Therefore, it is expected to open up to new treatments for anxiety-related disorders. For example, post-traumatic stress syndromes or hypersensitivity disorders such as autism, migraine and fibromyalgia.

THE sensory signals they come from different parts of the brain through different and independent pathways. It would be ideal to find only one circuit capable of integrating them. It had never been discovered until now, but recently researchers have found some news. They were able to measure the activity of mice neurons single in the thalamus and brainstem. Here, the sex-related peptide of calcitonin (Cgrp) proliferates in abundance. Using fluorescent proteins, the pathways that activate negative sensory stimuli as far as the amygdala have been reconstructed. There are two paths: useful for forming memories to keep dangers away.

Even in humans, the same brain regions express copious amounts of Cgrp. This suggests that the circuitry may be involved in psychiatric disorders related to threat perception.

Sung Han, research coordinator

The goal now is to check whether these neuronal pathways can be involved in: migrainepost-traumatic syndrome of tension and inautism.